Penn State Gets 21st Straight Win Over Maryland

Both coaches discounted the notion that Penn State has a hex over Maryland, but when the smoke cleared Saturday, the Nittany Lions had a 20-18 victory--beating the Terrapins for the 21st straight time.

“I don’t have any feeling for why we’ve won X-number of games in a row,” said Penn State’s Joe Paterno, who has been the head coach for the last 17 games of the streak.

The loss also snapped the Terrapins’ seven-game win streak, dating back to a loss last season to Penn State. It was the nation’s third-longest winning streak. The Nittany Lions have beaten Maryland in all but one of the 28 times the teams have met.

“I didn’t feel any jinx out there,” Maryland Coach Bobby Ross said. But Scott Schankweiler, a senior Maryland co-captain, said he felt differently.

“I wasn’t sure about anything when we had the ball at the end,” Schankweiler said. “The way things have gone in the past, you can’t take anything for granted against Penn State . . . and you saw how it turned out.

“We felt things were going our way but we never felt we were in real control.”

Maryland came back from a 17-0 lead to take an 18-7 lead on Rick Badanjek’s five-yard scoring run and a two-point conversion pass from holder Dan Henning to Chris Knight when the Terrapins faked kicking the extra point.

The 19th-ranked Nittany Lions regained the lead on Massimo Manca’s 46-yard field goal later in the third period and survived three scoring bids by No. 7 Maryland in the final quarter.

Ramon Paredes missed fourth-quarter field goal attempts of 34 and 51 yards, and Alvin Blount fumbled the ball away after catching a pass on the Penn State 30 with 38 seconds remaining.

Penn State’s Mike Zordich intercepted Stan Gelbaugh’s pass on the second play of the game and returned it 32 yards for touchdown after just 50 seconds. Another interception by Pete Giftopoulos at the Lions’ 11 blunted a Maryland drive and led to a 28-yard field goal by Manca late in the first quarter.